I was brought up to always tell the truth. And yet sometimes my parents lied, right through their teeth, shamelessly. The person they lied to was my grandmother. They did it because they were terrified of her — and because they were ashamed.
Recipe: Crispy Fish Salad With Parsley and Ciabatta Croutons
Every time we traveled somewhere, she would interrogate us on our return. “What?” she demanded, “you went to Rome and skipped the Vatican! That’s mad! You didn’t bother showing the kids the Sistine Chapel?” The outrage for having missed a key attraction made my parents feel like little children themselves.
So they lied. They made up visits to churches that we hadn’t set foot in, to national parks that were closed for the season and to restaurants that were beyond their budget. They made up the whole thing, and we kids happily played along.
These days, I don’t lie much. I don’t really find the need — unless, that is, I feel fear and shame. That’s why I lie only to my hygienist, to whom I seriously overrepresent my oral hygiene (“I floss twice a day, like clockwork”) and to my G.P., to whom I underrepresent my alcohol consumption (“three units a week, tops!”).
I did lie to the food editor Christopher Kimball once, though, for the same reasons.
It was 2012, and I was on a fleeting visit to San Francisco, promoting my book “Jerusalem” with my co-author, Sami Tamimi. Before going, my friend Nigella Lawson made me promise her to try the roast chicken and bread salad at Zuni Café. “It’s the best thing in the world,” she said. Not excellent. Not memorable. The best thing in the world.
My schedule was tight that day: lunch at Zuni Café, an interview for Kimball’s show at 1 p.m. and then off, at 2 p.m. sharp, to a Culinary Institute of America event.
Sami and I arrived at Zuni right as they opened. When our server cheerfully announced that the famous chicken would take 60 minutes, exactly the amount of time I had before the interview, we faced what should have been an obvious choice. Get something cold. Order the soup. Be sensible with schedules and responsibilities. Lie to Nigella.
Instead, we took it to the wire.
Certain dishes are the stuff of local myths, shared through whispered recommendations.
What arrived, precisely as we should have been leaving, was total vindication: roasted chicken still warm from the oven, carved into chunks, bread that had soaked up all the pan juice, bitter salad leaves and a sharp dressing, with pine nuts and currants scattered throughout. Each bite contained a little hit of sweet, sour and salt. It was by no means a traditional chicken salad, but the best version I could think of.
We ate the final bites standing up, keys in hand, checking our watches between mouthfuls, schedule dissolved.
Certain dishes are the stuff of local myths, shared through whispered recommendations. “You absolutely must …” “It’s the most extraordinary …” But some are even recognized far beyond their cities and regions — this very chicken salad, a jambon beurre at Chez Aline in Paris, the banana pudding at Magnolia Bakery in New York.
Many disappoint. How could they not? Give expectation room to breathe and grow, and it must inevitably deflate. You find yourself in some cherished spot, chewing quizzically, wondering if you’re missing something crucial.
But some encounters manage to sidestep this problem entirely. Perhaps it’s timing. Or context. The Zuni chicken salad succeeded not despite my frantic situation but because of it. We had no time to second-guess our own pleasure.
I’ve chased that chicken-salad experience countless times since, with the original recipe and others’ re-creations. I have had, I must confess, different degrees of success. But what I’m really chasing, I suppose, is that feeling of wanting something so badly, knowing you might never get the chance again.
I believe this fish version captures something of the same reckless spirit of that San Franciscan day. The interplay remains: sharp vinegar against sweet raisins, crisp nuts and yielding bread, everything bound together by good olive oil and better judgment suspended. I’ve traded slow-roasted chicken for quickly seared fish — perhaps a trauma response to that nail-biting wait — but the essentials remain.
Christopher Kimball, when I finally appeared 30 minutes late and thoroughly disheveled, listened to my breathless explanation about San Francisco traffic, moving on graciously. I was deeply embarrassed but truly satisfied.
Chris, if you’re reading this, I lied. I got waylaid by a chicken salad.
Yotam Ottolenghi is a writer and the chef-owner of the Ottolenghi restaurants, Nopi and Rovi, in London. He is an Eat columnist for The New York Times Magazine and writes a weekly column for The Guardian’s Feast Magazine.
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